A jetty projected into the river. A blinding sunlight drowned al this at times in a sudden recrudescence of glare. `There's your Company's station,' said the Swede, pointing to three wooden barrack-like structures on the rocky slope. Ì wil send your things up. Four boxes did you say? So. Farewel .'

"I came upon a boiler wal owing in the grass, then found a path leading up the hil . It turned aside for the bowlders, and also for an undersized railway-truck lying there on its back with its wheels in the air. One was off. The thing looked as dead as the carcass of some animal. I came upon more pieces of decaying machinery, a stack of rusty rails. To the left a clump of trees made a shady spot, where dark things seemed to stir feebly. I blinked, the path was steep. A horn tooted to the right, and I saw the black people run. A heavy and dul detonation shook the ground, a puff of smoke came out of the cliff, and that was al . No change appeared on the face of the rock. They were building a railway. The cliff was not in the way or anything; but this objectless blasting was al the work going on.

"A slight clinking behind me made me turn my head. Six black men advanced in a file, toiling up the path. They walked erect and slow, balancing smal baskets ful of earth on their heads, and the clink kept time with their footsteps. Black rags were wound round their loins, and the short ends behind wagged to and fro like tails. I could see every rib, the joints of their limbs were like knots in a rope; each had an iron col ar on his neck, and al were connected together with a chain whose bights swung between them, rhythmical y clinking. Another report from the cliff made me think suddenly of that ship of war I had seen firing into a continent. It was the same kind of ominous voice; but these men could by no stretch of imagination be cal ed enemies. They were cal ed criminals, and the outraged law, like the bursting shel s, had come to them, an insoluble mystery from over the sea. Al their meager breasts panted together, the violently dilated nostrils quivered, the eyes stared stonily uphil . They passed me within six inches, without a glance, with that complete, deathlike indifference of unhappy savages. Behind this raw matter one of the reclaimed, the product of the new forces at work, strol ed despondently, carrying a rifle by its middle. He had a uniform jacket with one button off, and Information prepared by the Project BookishMall.com legal advisor

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seeing a white man on the path, hoisted his weapon to his shoulder with alacrity. This was simple prudence, white men being so much alike at a distance that he could not tel who I might be.